Work Text:
When Simon finally got to hold hands with Baz—Tyrannus Basilton Grimm-Pitch. He texted that to Baz at the start of every text conversation for a week after he learned it—he was surprised by how rough his hands were. Also, after a week, his very, very angry autocorrect finally gave up stopped refusing to spell his name. That was a good day.
It still made his stomach do weird little flips every time they held hands, which was his favourite thing to do, tied for first with kissing, of course.
Simon carefully edged around a hoard of people who insisted upon walking at a snail’s pace and somehow took over the entire sidewalk even though there were only like four of them and the sidewalk was actually quite wide. He was on his way to a very important meeting… date? Date. Or meeting up for a date, however it was supposed to be classified. He didn’t actually have a lot of experience dating, so classifying things as dates was a little iffy.
With two very large (and very hot) white cups in hand—Baz’s weird coffee with just the right amount of chocolate, vanilla and cinnamon on top, and Somon’s own even weirder concoction with a modification in every box that made most people’s eyebrows raise as high as they could go—which Simon was trying to get to the music department before all the whipped cream melted.
When Baz told him that he was doing a double major in English Literature, and Music (as well as being captain of the football team. Simon got to see him in action last week. His boyfriend was fucking ruthless on the field) he was genuinely surprised.
Baz wasn’t entirely sure how to take the surprise. He settled on being defensive, dropping Simon’s hand that he’d been holding and everything.
“Why? You don’t think I can?”
“No, it’s not that!” Gimme back your hand please. “It’s just, sometimes you give off the vibe of someone who’d rather murder a person with violin strings—”
Baz snorted with a dramatic eye roll.
“—rather than play them, it’s all very surprising. I think you’re perfect at everything.”
Good save, Simon. Now if he’d just give me back his hand…
His new boyfriend contemplated this in silence for a few moments, before grabbing Simon’s hand.
Success! I don’t have to tell Penny I’m back to being single and forever alone. She’ll be so happy.
“Not the violin though,” Baz added before taking a sip of his coffee. “Maybe I’ll tell you one day.” His hair was up in a bun—Oh god Baz with a man-bun was one of the hottest things on the planet, help me I’m dying—because Simon was walking him to football practice, proudly displaying his hearing aids. They were black with a hint of glitter.
Baz told him that he wanted just plain black because they wouldn’t be quite so visible with his skin and hair colour, but his little sister, Mordelia, said they were boring and insisted upon adding glitter. Apparently Baz has a soft spot for his siblings because they were definitely glittery, and so perfectly ‘Baz’.
Simon tripped going up the stairs, but managed to save both drinks by sacrificing his knee.
Worth it, though.
He limped up the rest of the stairs to the second floor.
Not that he was late or anything. He was actually twenty minutes early, which was an absolute miracle.
Simon was always late for absolutely everything.
One time in high school, he arrived ten minutes early at Penny’s house, and she closed the door in his face, saying, “This is weird. Come back in eleven minutes.”
Baz had already caught onto this too, which is why Simon was extra excited because he got off work early and was going to surprise him.
What room did Baz say again? 204? 208? Was there even a two involved??
Simon could have just set down a coffee to check his phone, but that would be admitting defeat, and he was perfectly capable of finding his boyfriend on his own.
One of the doors at the end of the hall was cracked open a bit, letting the most enchanting sound escape it.
He didn’t know how he knew, but he knew it had to be Baz.
Carefully pushing the door open, Simon squeezed inside, juggling the two coffees, a rucksack full of textbooks and work clothes, and a limp.
Baz was sitting by the window, drenched in the light of the setting sun, looking like the sombre, brooding character in one of those animes Penny made him watch (okay she made me watch one episode and I watched the rest on my own don’t judge me), with a cello perched in front of him. The bow drifted across the strings, and Baz’s long callused fingers danced elegantly along with it, emitting a song that didn’t just echo in Simon’s ears, but actually vibrated in his chest.
It was like there was magic coursing through his entire body.
Now, being the new, mostly not terrible boyfriend of a Deaf person, Simon knew that Baz liked knowing when people were around him because he hated surprises.
Once, Simon had tried getting his boyfriend’s attention by throwing a pillow at him, and he learned very VERY quickly that this was not the ideal way to get Baz’s attention. With amazing reflexes (Baz was the captain of the university football team after all), he whipped the pillow back at Simon so hard he actually fell over and was worried he’d gotten a concussion for all of ten minutes. Baz didn’t seem overly concerned about it, just said “Don’t throw things as me, stupid,” and went back to reading his book.
Simon never threw things again. (That’s a lie, he still threw things, but never to get Baz’s attention. He made sure Baz was paying attention, then he threw things.)
Currently he didn’t want to get Baz’s attention. He was afraid if he distracted Baz, he’d stop playing and, I’m the most selfish person in the world right now.
He wasn’t sure how long he lingered in the back of the almost empty practice room. It could’ve been minutes. Might’ve been hours.
Probably not hours, the sun really hasn’t moved and—oh damn he stopped.
Baz noticed him standing awkwardly, holding two lukewarm coffees, looking windblown and ridiculous, set down his cello and bow down abruptly and noisily, rushing over to him.
Why is he wearing a fucking suit? No one should look that good in a suit, especially on a university campus, for fucks—
“You okay?” Baz asked, which was odd because he wasn’t wearing his hearing aids, and he really didn’t like having conversations without them in. Grey eyes (which had kind of a yellowish, bronzish glow to them today, probably from the sunlight) narrowed, giving him a once over as though something was wrong.
Simon handed over his boyfriend’s coffee and was quite embarrassed that his hand was shaking.
Baz took it with his left hand, and with his right gently wiped at Simon’s cheek. The barista was even more embarrassed to see that Baz’s finger came away wet.
“Fuck, I wasn’t crying.” Simon said automatically, wiping furiously at his face with the sleeve of his sweater (although it was more jacket weather than sweater weather).
Baz laughed at him. He was very good at guessing what people were saying, even though, in his own words, his lip reading was “pretty shite” though. He took the lid off his drink and licked the whipped cream that managed to stay solid off the lip. A little got on his upper lip, and Simon, finally finished ridding his face of the ridiculous tears, stood up on his tip toes to kiss it off. He was rewarded by another kiss and a low chuckle.
‘Beautiful,’ Simon signed proudly––he’d only been learning BSL for about a month, and he was absolute shite at languages and Baz wasn’t the most patent teacher at times.
Baz cocked an eyebrow, taking a sip his coffee.
‘What beautiful?’ he signed with a smirk.
Simon couldn’t remember the word for music, and with only one free hand it was a little difficult to spell CELLO (also he couldn’t remember the sign for ‘e’… although ‘o’ was similar to ‘e’… being in such close vicinity to Baz was making him flustered, and he couldn’t remember it), so he just pointed to the abandoned instrument.
Baz looked back at his cello and scowled into his cup.
Simon saw it of course and offered a broad grin, which made Baz soften a bit.
‘And you.’ He carefully signed.
Baz regained his smirk and took another long sip with his ‘I know’ expression.
The barista shuffled around in his bag with one hand for some paper, or a notebook, or something like that because he couldn’t remember the correct sign. He gave up after three seconds because his back was too full, and remembered his phone was in his back pocket.
“Play that again,” he quickly typed into the notes on his phone.
Baz smiled softly, and gestured to his coffee.
“Fine, but after you finished your coffee, you’re going to play that again,” Simon typed out, heading over to the window near Baz’s seat.
After carefully setting his cello in its case, his boyfriend laughed when he read it. He sat down under the window and Simon made sure to sit on his right because that was Baz’s better ear.
Baz took his hand and they sat in a pleasant silence.